The Cowgirl's Forever Family

One Week To Build A Happy-Ever-After?

The cowgirl: Brooke Laughton wants one thing: the family she can’t have. When a gorgeous man and a giggling baby girl step onto her Cedar River ranch, her dream comes true. Or so she hopes...

The city boy: Tyler Madden wants to find the baby’s unwitting birth father—Brooke’s missing brother—and fulfill a promise to the late mother. Then he can go back to his lucrative law practice. Or so he hopes...

But one little baby has a different agenda. Little Cara wants a family...and the lonely cowgirl and the commitment-phobic lawyer are just the mommy and daddy she needs! She’s got one week to show them what’s right in front of them. Desire. Love. And the promise of a forever family...

Man and baby took her breath away.

Standing in her driveway, Tyler looked too gorgeous for her peace of mind. It took two seconds to figure out she wasn’t immune to him. She’d been out of action when it came to dating and sex. But right then, in low-riding jeans and a baby on his hip, Tyler was the sexiest man she’d ever seen. And her hibernating libido immediately kick-started out of slumber.

“You wanted me,” he said, his blistering gaze connecting with hers. “So you have me.”

She could have played dumb, but she knew she’d swindled him out of his hotel and onto her ranch. “So you’ll stay?”

“We’ll stay. For a week.”

Part of her was delighted but another part was nervous. After two years, sharing her home with a man tied her belly in knots.

This is about the baby...not him.

She took a deep breath and led him inside. As he entered, he turned to look at her. A gust of awareness swept the house, an intimacy that defied logic and made her hot all over. His gaze held her captive, and no matter how she tried, she couldn’t look away.

It was going to be a long week.

* * *

The Cedar Rivier Cowboys: Riding into town with romance on their minds!

Dear Reader,

Welcome back to Cedar River, South Dakota! Also welcome to my tenth book for Harlequin Special Edition, The Cowgirl’s Forever Family.

Brooke Laughton is a former barrel racer turned rancher. She’s also a kind and generous woman who longs for a family of her own—something she believes she will never have after a long-running battle with infertility. But when a handsome stranger turns up on her doorstep with a baby in his arms, she feels like someone may have just handed her the moon. The baby is the motherless child of her younger and absent brother, and the stranger is Tyler Madden, a New York lawyer who is now calling all the shots regarding her niece. As she tries to get her brother to come home and keep the bank from foreclosing on the ranch, Brooke realizes that it’s not only the baby who is capturing her heart, but also the no-nonsense, no-commitment man, who is clearly daddy and husband material...even if he doesn’t know it!

I loved writing Brooke and Tyler’s story and seeing how these two very different people became a family together. Families come about in many ways—maybe through partnerships or marriage, birth or adoption—but the binding factor is always love. I do hope you enjoy The Cowgirl’s Forever Family, and I’d like to invite you back to Cedar River very soon for my next book.

I adore hearing from readers and can be reached by email, Twitter and Facebook, or sign up for my newsletter via my website at helenlacey.com. Please visit anytime, as I love talking about my pets, my horses and of course, cowboys. I’ll also be sharing news about my latest series for Harlequin Special Edition, The Cedar River Cowboys!

Warmest wishes,

Helen Lacey

The Cowgirl’s Forever Family

Helen Lacey

www.millsandboon.co.uk

HELEN LACEY grew up reading Black Beauty and Little House on the Prairie. These childhood classics inspired her to write her first book when she was seven, a story about a girl and her horse. She loves writing for Mills & Boon Cherish, where she can create strong heroes with a soft heart and heroines with gumption who get their happily-ever-after. For more about Helen, visit her website, www.helenlacey.com.

For my wonderfully supportive editor, Susan Litman—who allowed me the time I needed for this one. Thank you.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Dear Reader

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Epilogue

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

Brooke Laughton shot up in bed.

Rubbing her eyes, she quickly checked the clock. Nine twenty. She’d been in bed for less than fifteen minutes. The dogs were barking, which meant either one of the horses were out, a feral cat had found its way into the chicken run again—or someone was skulking around the ranch house.

Swinging her legs off the bed, she pulled on the sweatpants she’d discarded fifteen minutes earlier and grabbed her sweater. The dogs were still barking and she heard a sound—the slam of a car door. Tension snaked up her spine. Not that she was scared. She could handle herself and the rifle she kept stashed in her wardrobe. She grabbed the gun, shoved her feet into a pair of loafers and left the room. The floorboards creaked as she made her way down the hallway and when she reached the living room doorway, she blinked at the lights beaming through the front window.